Eli Bridge Co.: Cycloid/Fire Storm

In recent discussions on rec.roller-coaster, the Eli Bridge Co. Scrambler has come up a couple of times, and ultimately has led to me bringing up the Eli Cycloid. It seems that few people have ever heard of this ride, or even seen one, let alone ridden one. Furthermore, I haven't been able to find any information about it on the Web. Personally, I think it's one of the better new rides out there, so in an effort to clear up some of the confusion, I've tried to describe it on this page.

In 1997, the Eli Bridge Company introduced a new portable amusement ride. Eli Bridge doesn't build bridges, but for the past hundred years it has built more Ferris wheels than anybody else, and is also well known for the ubiquitous Scrambler ride. For 1997, they redesigned the Scrambler, creating the ride pictured above, the Eli Cycloid.

Perhaps
it's a little easier to see in this drawing. The Cycloid starts with
basically the same design as the Scrambler with a centerpole and three
unit poles attached to sweeps extending from the center. Each unit pole caries
four sweeps as on the Scrambler. The first obvious change is that instead
of a single aluminum tub at the end of each unit pole sweep, facing in the direction
of unit-pole rotation, there are two Fiberglas tubs at the end of each unit-pole
sweep, facing towards the center of the unit pole. Each seat has a ratcheting
lap bar; each seat can accommodate two adults or three children, just like the
original Scrambler seats. So the Cycloid has double the capacity
of the Scrambler.

But wait, there's more! While the Scrambler uses a gear on the
center bearing to drive the unit pole rotations, the Cycloid uses independent
hydraulic motors for the four rotating axes. And this is what makes the ride
significantly different. The center of the Cycloid can be rotated in
either direction at up to 8 RPM. Which is slower than a Scrambler. But because
it can go either direction, the result is two distinctly different acceleration
patterns. Even though the center rotation is slower than a Scrambler
(a Scrambler runs at 11.4 RPM), because the seats are positioned facing
the unit pole center, the forces exerted by the ride are redirected to push
riders back in the seat instead of out to the side. It just so happens that
the human body can more easily tolerate high accelerations in that direction
than in other directions. So while the Scrambler generates lateral forces
up to about 1.5 G, the Cycloid unit poles rotate at up to 19 RPM, generating
a maximum force of close to 3 G! Best of all from the showman's point of view,
the Cycloid still fits on a single trailer.

After introducing the Cycloid, Eli Bridge advertised an identical ride
with a different paint scheme called the Fire Storm. Since then, Eli
Bridge has had a tremendous success with their Construction Zone kiddie
ride. I have no idea how many Cycloid/Fire Storm rides Eli has sold,
but one of the first ones (S/N 98-01. The first one? The only one?) was apparently
sold to Bates Amusements, and I was able to ride it at the I-X Indoor Amusement
Park in 1998.

If you've seen another Cycloid or Fire Storm, please let
me know. I have no idea how many of these there are.

Note: All photos on this page were adapted from Eli Bridge Co. advertising materials.